Clerk at Supreme Court facing multiple charges

Mon, 8 August 2016 ppp

Niem Chheng

A clerk only recently arrived to the Supreme Court was sent to pretrial detention yesterday after being charged with as-yet-unspecified misappropriation of public funds and abuses of power.

Phnom Penh Municipal Court spokesman Ly Sophana, who is also the prosecutor on the case, said the clerk was officially charged by the investigating judge at 5pm.

“After face-to-face questioning, investigating judge Ros Piseth decided to detain the accused Vat Viseth provisionally for misappropriation of public funds and abuse of power according to articles 592 of the Criminal Code and 32 and 35 of the Anti-Corruption Law,” Sophana said.

Neither Sophana nor Anti-Corruption Unit President Om Yentieng would give details of Viseth’s alleged offences. Yentieng told a reporter he would elaborate after the judge made his ruling, but could not be reached afterwards.

Supreme Court judge Dith Munty said he did not know the reason for Viseth’s transfer from Pailin Provincial Court, but that he had taken up his new post within the past three months.

In the last fortnight, a Foreign Ministry official was handed two years in jail following a conviction for graft and misappropriation of funds.

Meanwhile, former ambassador to South Korea Suth Dina has been in pretrial detention on corruption charges since early April.